Week Six: Day 1 – When Life is Very Difficult

In this phase of growing a Rule of Life, we’re looking at how we can grow a Rule which will help us through all the seasons of life. I had the great joy of living for several years at our country monastery, Emery House, where I’m sitting now, and during those years it was particularly wonderful to sit every day in our chapel looking out over the beautiful countryside and as the months passed, seeing the trees change and everything take on the color of the changing seasons. And in the summer particularly, and perhaps the spring, it was particularly beautiful and it was a joy to be out in the gardens helping grow fruit and take care of the property. But I remember when the New England winter came, everything changed and it became really quite bleak and cold and I really didn’t want to go out at all. And in a kind of interesting parallel, I think growing a Rule of Life is very similar to that, that at times it’s actually very easy to live the life of faith. Prayer comes to us naturally, we feel drawn to God, and we look at God’s creation and our hearts are filled with joy.

But there are other times in our life when life becomes more barren, more bare. Perhaps we have experienced a bereavement or a change in our plans or our hopes. In those times, it’s much more difficult to embrace life. But actually, in my own experience, it is exactly during those times when having a Rule of Life in place becomes so important. It is then that we really need to turn to those rhythms, those disciplines which we have grown and established, because they will uphold us and they will support us and strengthen us when we feel that life is very, very difficult.

There is a hymn, which I love, which we sing at Easter. Most of the hymns at Easter are joyful hymns. There is one which is in more of a minor key and you will probably know it, it’s called “Now the green blade rises, from the buried grain.” And the underlying imagery of that hymn is that, when we look out at a wintry scene, it seems that everything is dead, but actually underneath the surface something actually very powerful and wonderful is happening and something is slowly growing and when spring comes it bursts out to life again. And that hymn talks about particularly those times when the fields of our heart are dead and bare and we feel really quite desolate. But it’s at those times, when we remain faithful to our commitment to our Rule, it is precisely then that we can experience the wonder and the miracle, as the hymn puts it, of love coming again like wheat which springs up green.

I think this phase of looking at our Rule of Life encourages us to think of the rhythms of our own lives. The rhythms, the summer, the winter, the spring, the autumn of our own lives and how we can maintain our life of faith, our relationship with God, our love for God, during those difficult times and to ask who can companion us during those times and who can help us to cultivate the garden of our lives through every season.

– Br. Geoffrey Tristram

Question to Journal
What has sustained you through challenging seasons in the past?

This Week’s Podcast Episode 

This Week’s Workbook Exercise 

Using the exercise begin your ‘Garden Plot’ or Rule of Life which maybe divided into four sections: your Relationship with God, your Relationship with Self, your Relationship with Others, and your Relationship with Creation. Each of these sections is divided into three rings:

The inner ring, for ‘Daily Upkeep,’ will include disciplines or practices you decide to do every day. The middle ring, for ‘Weekly Fertilizing,’ is a place to record practices that you will do each week. The outer ring, for ‘Seasonal Care,’ lists practices that are only done occasionally – annually, semi-annually, or quarterly.

Use your notes from past sessions to guide this time of reflection. For each section write down a few simple, realistic steps you can take to nurture your relationship with God, with Self, with Others, and with Creation. Decide what you will do each day, each week, and each season or year.